Bird flu vaccine 'ready in weeks'By Sue Dunlevy
January 30, 2007 01:47pm
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AUSTRALIAN drug company CSL has developed a vaccine it says will prevent the deadly bird flu.
Trials results show that two 30mg doses of the antigen developed by CSL are effective in preventing bird flu in adults aged up to 65.
The vaccine has also been shown to prevent animals dying from the bird flu virus, the company says.
CSL will ask Australia’s drug watchdog, the Therapeutic Goods Administration, next month to check the safety and efficacy of the vaccine and register it on the Australian market.
CSL spokeswoman Dr Rachael David said the company can produce doses of the vaccine within six weeks.
‘We could make sufficient doses of the vaccine for the entire Australian population within six months," she said.
The vaccine has been developed with Federal Government money and trials of its effectiveness in infants, young children and the frail aged are still under way.
Ms David said there were no serious side effects from the vaccine.
‘’It’s just like a normal flu vaccine some people get mild viral symptoms and swelling at the injection site," she said.
Fears of a worldwide bird flu pandemic that could kill millions have been mounting this month with outbreaks of the disease in bird populations across Asia.
Hundreds of thousands of birds have been slaughtered in Japan, South Korea and Thailand in a bid to contain the bug which to date has infected 267 people and killed 163.
Four people died from the disease in Indonesia this month.
To date there has been no way of protecting populations against the disease.
Governments have instead been stockpiling supplies of anti-viral medication Tamiflu even though there is no proof it will be of use in preventing deaths from the virus.
CSL has developed its vaccine using an Indonesian strain of the H5N1 bird flu virus but says it can easily be adapted to combat other strains of the virus.
"It is a master file," Ms David said.
"The way we have approached it is to combat any strain of avian flu, obviously we would need to alter some things in it to deal with different strains," she said.
Ms David said the Federal Government would have to decide whether to release the vaccine for use in countries outside Australia.
She said the company therefore had not offered it to Indonesian authorities during the recent outbreak there.
"CSL is delighted to reassure the community that the Australian Government will be able to respond with CSL’s vaccine in the event that an influenza pandemic affects Australia," Dr Andrew Cuthbertson, CSL’s chief scientific officer said today.
He said research was continuing to refine the vaccine so that it could offer cross-protection against similar but non-identical bird flu strains.
The Australian Government contributed $7.2 million towards the costs of developing the vaccine.
A spokeswoman for the Therapeutic Goods Administration said the safety watchdog would consider the vaccine "expeditiously
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Bird flu vaccine 'ready in weeks'By Sue DunlevyJanuary 30, 2007...
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